Couldn't Let This One Pass
“A man is not saved because he believes in Christ; he believes in Christ because he is saved.”
- Loraine Boettner, The Reformed Doctrine of Predestination (Philadelphia, PA: P&R Publishing, 1965), 101.
It cause me to think of the "Ordo Salutis" (that's "order of salvation" for all you Latin neophytes, like me!)
Preaching To Myself
I came across this today, in my newsfeeder (hmmm, kinda like a bird heading off to the feeder each morning and finding tasty morsels):
“The gospel shows us that our spiritual problem lies not only in failing to obey God, but also in relying on our obedience to make us fully acceptable to God, ourselves and others.
Every kind of character flaw comes from this natural impulse to be our own savior through our performance and achievement. On the one hand, proud and disdainful personalities come from basing your identity on your performance and thinking you are succeeding. But on the other hand, discouraged and self-loathing personalities also come from basing your identity on your performance and thinking you are failing.
Belief in the gospel is not just the way to enter the kingdom of God; it is the way to address every obstacle and grow in every aspect. The gospel is not just the “ABCs” but the “A-to-Z” of the Christian life.
The gospel is the way that anything is renewed and transformed by Christ — whether a heart, a relationship, a church, or a community. All our problems come from a lack of orientation to the gospel. Put positively, the gospel transforms our hearts, our thinking and our approach to absolutely everything.”
- Timothy Keller, Paul’s Letter to the Galatians: Living in Line with the Truth of the Gospel (Redeemer Presbyterian Church, 2003), 2.
When I went to do my search for an appropriate graphic to help make it "stand out", I found this:
Yes, indeed. Preach the gospel to yourself. I need to preach to me. You need to preach to you. We need the gospel. We need Jesus Christ. May Jesus Christ be seen in me today.
Biblical Manhood & Womanhood
Here's my theme & outline from Mother's Day:
Theme: The manner in which we honor women and help them serve in the church will honor the Lord and uphold the Gospel.
Here are the 4 foundational truths & then, to conclude, I’ll seek to draw some basic applications for us:
• We’re to honor God thru the practice of biblical womanhood because
1. it is grounded in the order of creation
2. it is grounded in the doctrine of God
3. it is grounded in the doctrine of Christ
4. it is grounded in the doctrine of the church
Now, I'll give you the theme & outline from this past Lord's Day, June 8, 2008:
Theme: Christ is glorified when a woman submits to her husband.
Introduction - Context! Context! Context!
Submission
What it's not
What it is
It's manner
It's extent
Glorifying Christ
My loving bride of nearly 27 years provided me with this letter from Nancy Leigh Demoss at Revive Our Hearts. I thought this was especially apropos given the manner in which I ended last Sunday's message and the way in which I'll end this week's message to the men:
[this is a testimony Nancy received]
Oh, what a sinner am I!!! Through your teaching about biblical womanhood, God has shown me how wrong I've been all of these years. I'm married to the best man in the world, yet I've been treating him like the scum of the earth.
The only bad thing I can say about my husband is that he married me, a wretched sinner! Instead of lifting him up I tear him down with my attitude, I have stabbed him in the heart with the sword of my tongue. Instead of encouraging him I discourage him; I point out his faults without seeing my own. All this time I thought I was doing things right - and I wonder why my husband won't take the lead?
If I were to die this very moment would my husband know I love him? One word...NO. Oh, how I have hurt him, and I didn't even realize it. Instead of praying for God to change my husband, I'll be praying for God to change me! To make me the woman that my husband deserves.
I've really hurt my husband, but from this moment on and with God's help I am determined to be the wife that I was called to be and to make our home a refuge for my husband. Maybe once again my husband will look at me like he did on our wedding day, with absolute love and adoration. Thank you so much for your teaching, Nancy. I'm sure my husband will thank you, too, when he sees my transformation!
The ending to last week's message (and, in a very similar vein, the ending to this coming Sunday's message) went like this:
Ladies, do you want to know what the best weapon for living like a godly woman is?
Often, believing wives of unbelieving husbands are told to have the kind of spirit & life that might win her husband. How can this happen? And believing wives of believing husband; you're told to submit to your husband as the Church does to the Lord? How can you do this?
Well, you can meet as women to hold each other accountable. You can pray diligently for each other in this role. You can even think of all the dire consequences if you don’t live this way, in order to try to motivate yourself to do better. But none of these are your best weapon in fighting for faith & glorifying God. If you don’t remember the very nature of your own sin and your tremendous need of grace, you’ll fight a losing battle. You’ll buck up against Scripture’s teaching & cave to cultural norms. You’ll beat yourself silly with guilt & shame because you don’t want to do this.
But if you remember nature of your sin & your need of God’s grace, you'll win that fight. If you call to mind that you are in Christ; if you realize He’s never ashamed to call you His child; then there is nothing that you can do to warrant condemnation. You’re salvation in Christ is so rich & so free, that you’re able to give your life totally to God. Yes, you’re to work out your salvation – even in your marriage & submitting to your husband. But remember, you can do this because God is working in you, both to have the will to do this & to actually do it. When you recall to mind that Jesus Christ is the Author & Perfecter of your faith, then you can’t stop giving yourself to Him. He gets it all, and there is your freedom from the bondage of sin & cultural rebellion to His Word to you.
Then, you can give yourself unreservedly, unhesitatingly, unequivocally body, soul, & spirit to the One who loves you, who will never let you go. And when you do that, you will submit, respect & love your husband in such a way that all will say: she loves the Lord Jesus Christ. And He will say to you on that Great Day: Well, done, my daughter; enter into your eternal rest.
Selfishness
Chapter 12 of Bridges' book is on selfishness: a sin that we are clearly born with. Don't believe me? Before you even read about it in Scripture, look to an infant, who cries the very moment he/she is hungry. Observe preschoolers trying to play together during recess at school. Watch a basketball game with the 9th Grade team or the Varsity from our kids' school (lots of talent; too much selfishness). Bridges points out that the reason selfishness is so difficult to expose in our own life is because it is so easy to spot in others. He then goes on to deal with four areas of selfishness:
1. Interests. Philippians 2.4 says: "Let each of you look not only to his own interests, but also to the interests of others." We're to look out for the concerns and needs of others around us; mighty hard to do when it's our own concerns that consume us. Our interests change, often depending upon the season of life we're going through. The author offers a test for us in this area: "A good test of the degree of selfishness in our interests would be to reflect on the conversation after you have been with someone and ask yourself how much time you spent talking about your interests compared to listening to the other person."
2. Time. Presently, this currency is more valuable than money to many of us. We don't have enough of it and we want more of it. When we get it, we don't want to save it up, we want to use it up upon ourselves. When we neglect the needs of others, it not just because our own interests are taking a higher place; it's also because we think our time is more valuable than theirs. Need an example: just watch the way you drive and think about driving next time. If you're zipping around people, muttering under your breath (or shouting out loud) about how much they're impeding your progress, then you need to examine your heart. In Galatians 6.2, God tells us to "bear one another's burdens." Put aside selfishness by helping others, giving them of your time.
3. Money. This would have been obvious to most of us. But Bridges doesn't talk about the selfishness of greed, at least not in the sense of gaining more. He directs our attention to the selfishness of not giving. Each year, WORLD magazine lists the results of surveys about the state of financial charity and giving. It's never encouraging. And when it comes to the church in this country, it's down right abysmal. If I remember last year's stats, it was somewhere around 2.5% given by church-going people. The observation was made, that if all who go to church (and surely, not all these would be truly regenerate) would double their present giving, there would be sufficient monies to feed nearly every starving person in Africa. Imagine what would happen if we'd tithe? John addresses our need to give to others and not be selfish in 1 John 3.17: "But if anyone has the world’s goods and sees his brother in need, yet closes his heart against him, how does God’s love abide in him?"
4. Inconsiderateness. This gets worked out when we fail to think about how our actions or words affect someone else, whether they were the intended target or not. The person who is always late exhibits this sinful tendency. (Don't start making excuses for why you're always late; just repent, change and don't be late any more! Plan better and think of those you're holding up while they wait for you.) Cell phone etiquette is non-existent in our culture; which is an outworking of our selfish way of thinking and using this little device that has become so indispensable. Too many, especially among Christians, just have the attitude: "I say what I think. I call'em like I see'em. I speak my mind and I try to speak the truth." But do you try to speak the truth in love? (Ephesians 4.15)
The unselfish person seeks the other's good, concerns and interests ahead of his own. She seeks to balance her own longings with those of others around her. Obviously, our greatest example is Jesus Christ – "For you know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, that though he was rich, yet for your sake he became poor, so that you by his poverty might become rich." (2 Corinthians 8.9) I'm wondering if more families in their own homes would seek to put this sin to death, what difference would it make? At home, with our own families, we often put off all restraints, which means our own personal needs begin to take precedence over that of other family members. May we all ask the Holy Spirit to show us the evidence of selfishness in our lives. Then, may He grant us grace and strength to put off this besetting sin.
Let Me Wrestle
The heading for this section (if I understand correctly, Owen didn't really use chapters in his original) is this: There Will Be No Mortification of Any Sin Without Sincerity and Diligence in a Universality of Obedience. That's quite a mouthful sort of way of saying, "If I don't apply sincere diligence in my obedience in all areas of my life, especially in order to kill the desire to sin in my life, then I won't really be killing sin." To help better explain this, let me cite the first paragraph:
A man finds any lust to bring him into the condition formerly described; it is powerful, strong, tumultuating, leads captive, vexes, disquiets takes away peace; he is not able to bear it; wherefore he sets himself against it, prays against it, groans under it, sighs to be delivered; but in the meantime, perhaps, in other duties – in constant communion with God – in reading, prayer, and meditation – in other ways that are not of the same kind with the lust wherewith he is troubled – he is loose and negligent. Let not that man think that ever he shall arrive to the mortification of the lust he is perplexed with.
In other words, if I simply try to fight one area of sin, and not all others, and if I don't apply the same effort through the means of grace God has given me to commune with Him and grow in holiness, why on earth would I have any inkling that the one sin I want to be rid of will be got rid of? As Owen points out, it is all rooted in self-love: this one sin – or area of sin – bugs the daylights out of me; enough to make me go to great lengths to have some measure of peace in my heart against it. At the same time, however, I allow so many other areas to run full of neglect and sin and vile wickedness; or, I neglect my duties before God and man, in such a way as to show I really only want a bit of relief from the guilt of this sin, not the actual killing of it.
I was once asked by a young person, why God allowed us to continue in sin once we've become a Christian. Why didn't He simply blot out all sin in our life? Or, if I might add to that question, why doesn't He help me to blot out this one area of sin in my life that seems to beset me more than any other? Owen replies thusly:
Now, can you think that God will set in with such hypocritical endeavors – that ever his Spirit will bear witness to the treachery and falsehood of your spirit? Do you think he will ease you of that which perplexes you, that you may be at liberty to that which no less grieves him? No. God says, "Here is one, if he could be rid of this lust I should never hear of him more; let him wrestle with this, or he is lost."
Lord, let me wrestle. Grant me strength to do it, but let me wrestle. If You were to truly find me forsaking fellowship and communion with You simply because I pinned one sin to the mat and felt I had victory in my life, then let me wrestle! Do not leave me alone. Do not forsake me. Drive me to my knees in seeking all those areas in which I need kill sin.
He Is Full of Grace
Sermon Notes
December 23, 2007
“He Is… Full of Grace”
Text:
John 1.16
Theme:
Introduction:
he was born in 1725 to a very godly mother & very
ungodly father
• his mother sought to raise him according to God’s
Word
• however, she died when he was six, leaving him to
his father and eventually, to a new step-mother, who
knew nothing of God & His Word
• he only went to school for two years, & at age
11 began sailing with his father, making many trips
to the Mediterranean by the age of
18
• his father was a harsh, stern man; of him he wrote:
"I am persuaded he loved me, but he seemed not
willing that I should know it. I was with him in a
state of fear and bondage. His sternness . . . broke
and overawed my spirit."
• at 18, he was forced to join the
navy
"The
companions he met with here completed the ruin of his
principles." Of himself he wrote, "I was capable of
anything; I had not the least fear of God
before my eyes, nor (so far as I remember) the least
sensibility of conscience. . . . On one of his visits
home he deserted the ship and was caught,
"confined two days in the guard-house; . . . kept a
while in irons . . . publicly stripped and
whipped, degraded from his
office."
When
he was 20 years old he was put off his ship on some
small islands just southeast of Sierra Leone,
West Africa, and for about a year and a half he lived
as a virtual slave in almost destitute
circumstances. The wife of his master despised
him and treated him cruelly. He wrote that even the
African slaves would try to smuggle him food
from their own slim rations. Later in life he
marveled at the seemingly accidental way a ship
put anchor on his island after seeing some smoke, and
just happened to be a ship with a captain who knew
Newton's father and managed to free him from his
bondage. That was February, 1747. He was not
quite 21, and God was about to close
in.
Just
a bit over a year later, while this ship was finally
headed for home, he had a powerful
experience
He awoke in the night to a violent storm as his room
began to fill with water. As he ran for the deck,
the captain stopped him and had him fetch a
knife. The man who went up in his place was
immediately washed overboard.[14] He was
assigned to the pumps and heard himself say, "If this
will not do, the Lord have mercy upon us."[15]
It was the first time he had expressed the need for
mercy in many years. He worked the pumps from three
in the morning until noon, slept for an hour, and
then took the helm and steered the ship till
midnight. At the wheel he had time to think back over
his life and his spiritual condition. At about
six o'clock the next evening it seemed as though
there might be hope. "I thought I saw the hand
of God displayed in our favour. I began to pray: I
could not utter the prayer of faith; I could
not draw near to a reconciled God, and call him
Father . . . the comfortless principles of infidelity
were deeply riveted; . . . . The great question
now was, how to obtain faith."[16] He found a Bible
and got help from Luke 11:13, which promises the Holy
Spirit to those who ask. He reasoned, "If this
book be true, the promise in this passage must be
true likewise. I have need of that very Spirit,
by which the whole was written, in order to
understand it aright. He has engaged here to give
that Spirit to those who ask: I must therefore
pray for it; and, if it be of God, he will make good
on his own word."[17] He spent all the rest of
the voyage in deep seriousness as he read and prayed
over the Scriptures. On April 8 they anchored
in Ireland, and the next day the storm at sea was so
violent they would have surely been sunk.
Newton described what God had done in those two
weeks:
Thus
far I was answered, that before we arrived in
Ireland, I had a satisfactory evidence in my
own mind of the truth of the Gospel, as considered in
itself, and of its exact suitableness to answer
all my needs. . . . I stood in need of an Almighty
Savior; and such a one I found described in the
New Testament. Thus far the Lord had wrought a
marvelous thing: I was no longer an infidel: I
heartily renounced my former profaneness, and had
taken up some right notions; was seriously
disposed, and sincerely touched with a sense of the
undeserved mercy I had received, in being
brought safe through so many dangers. I was sorry for
my past misspent life, and purposed an
immediate reformation. I was quite freed from the
habit of swearing, which seemed to have been as
deeply rooted in me as a second nature. Thus, to
all appearance, I was a new
man.
This
was the beginning of his conversion… it wasn’t yet
complete
• for six years after this experience he had no one
to counsel him in the things of God or the ways of
Christ
• he became the captain of a slave-trading ship was
at sea for another year
• he married his sweetheart, Mary, in
1750
• a few months later, he learned his father drowned
while swimming in the Hudson Bay
• during the course of a third, long voyage, in 1754,
he had an epileptic seizure and never sailed
again
• upon returning home & to land permanently, he
entered into ministry
• he became the pastor of a church in Olney,
England
• he became great friends with the likes of George
Whitefield, William Carey, Charles Simeon and John
Wesley
• he pastured William Cowper, one of England’s
greatest poets and a hymnwriter, God Moves In a
Mysterious Way, There Is a
Fountain
This
man died, December 21, 1802, at the age of
82
• God had truly blessed him with grace upon
grace
• he never ceased to be amazed at this: that such a
wretch should not only be spared and pardoned, but
reserved to the honour of preaching [the] Gospel,
which he had blasphemed and renounced…. This is
wonderful indeed. The more God exalted him, the more
abased he felt he should be
He
wrote a hymn in the early 1760s
• he said, I know not that I have ever since met so
daring a blasphemer
• his text for the hymn was 1 Chronicles
17.16: Then King
David went in and sat before the LORD and said, “Who
am I, O LORD God, and what is my house, that you have
brought me thus far?
• these are the words to a fairly well-known hymn,
sung for the first time, New Year’s
Day,
• Amazing grace, how sweet the sound, that saved a
wretch like me
• I once was lost, but now am found, was blind but
now I see
John Newton
wrote his own epitaph, just prior to his
death
• clerk, once an infidel and libertine, a servant of
slaves in Africa, was by the rich mercy of our Lord
and Savior Jesus Christ, preserved, restored,
pardoned, and appointed to preach the faith he had
long laboured to destroy
I.
From His Fullness We Have Received
• John Newton knew the fullness of God in Christ
Jesus
• he had received it, experienced it, knew it
intimately
• John, the disciple & evangelist, as he wrote
these words, knew it
• he had seen it, heard it, even touched the very
fullness of God in Christ
• most of you here this morning have received of the
fullness of God in Christ
• what is this fullness?
1. literally:
means not lacking anything, complete, perfect, filled
up
• there is no lack in Jesus Christ; no shortage of
anything good
• Jesus was perfect: He is God and man both,
perfect
• Colossians 2.9 tells us: for in him the whole
fullness of deity dwells bodily
• everything that God is, Christ is: In the beginning
was the Word and the Word was with God and the Word
was God
2. we have
received
• time simply does not permit to go long on
this
• however, we know that it means
this:
• Col 2.10
• it is part of God’s great purpose for us as
Christians & as His church: Eph.
4.12-13
• again, we read of this: Colossians
1.19-22
• the very fullness of God is ours in Christ
Jesus
• it is the Apostle’s great prayer for us as well:
Ephesians 3.18-19
• and we have received it: a gift, a grace gift,
undeserved, unearned, all of God’s
grace
3. Christ is
everything for us
• His salvation is complete; His forgiveness is
total; His love is overwhelming; His presence is
everlasting
• when anxious about what tomorrow might bring: He is
complete in His love & care & provision for
all that you will need tomorrow
• when you’ve been hurt deeply by someone: He brings
the fullness of His compassion & healing to your
heart
• when you’re tempted to lust and covetousness: His
fullness is there for you, bringing you a delight
& satisfaction no person, picture, image or
possession can ever bring
• when anger with your spouse makes you think
unspeakable thoughts, even only for a moment: He is
there, with all the fullness of deity, waiting to be
brought to bear for healing, forgiveness, love
restored, and a peace that passes
understanding
II. Grace Upon Grace
• if you and I were to sit down and begin to recount
the graces we’ve received thru Christ, we could sit
here for a long time
• John piles his words up here in this attempt to
convey the fullness of Christ’s
grace
• it’s simply like saying: you cannot exhaust His
grace
• just when it appears that one might be running out
or complete, another comes along
• there is grace upon grace upon grace upon grace for
us in Christ Jesus
• and we’ve received it, right here, in Christmas,
Christ’s advent
• He is the Word who was with God and who was God:
fullness of grace that is
never-ending
• He didn’t consider staying there in heaven with God
as a thing to be grasped as His
alone
• He willingly, humbly let it go and took on flesh
and dwelt among us, the very fullness of God, in
order to bring us Himself and His amazing grace upon
grace upon grace
• this fullness of deity brought light into this dark
world
• but not only that, He brought light into our
sin-darkened heart, wretched sinful creatures that we
were – or still are, He brings His light to bear upon
you, even now where you sit
• oh, and this fullness is as of the only Son from
the Father; He is with us & by us & in
us
• and to speak of grace in this is glorious; it is
amazing
• consider that He came unto His own – His own what?
People, the Jews? Yes, but more
• He came unto His own creation, His own creatures –
He came to men & women
• but we didn’t receive Him, we didn’t want Him; like
John Newton, we were infidels and blasphemers and
sinners so reprehensible that there should be nothing
we deserved but everlasting
judgment
• but grace upon grace upon grace is ours in Christ
Jesus: to those who did receive Him, who believed on
His name, to them, grace upon grace, He gave the
right to become children of God
• oh how I pray that we’ll get this, this Christmas:
to see His fullness which we have
received
• to know that this is grace & to know it’s power
to deliver & forgive & heal &
comfort
• and that we’ll live it! Yes, live it before the
world and before the church
Conclusion
– one more story, if I may, about a man who knew this
fullness of grace
• it’s been nearly three months now, since Bill
died
• many things written & said about him & his
life & his testimony to Christ
• one of God’s graces He gave me this morning at 4.30
am was a blog entry from one who had only met him
days before he died. He writes:
Back
on that evening when I met Bill for the first, and
last, time, when he offered to tell me his life
story, he started it by saying it would only take a
few minutes. Lying on his back, he then raised
his arm above his head to look at his watch to see
the time. Here was a man whose life’s story was
about to end, timing the life story he was about to
begin. He’s dying, but he doesn’t want to waste
my time. In this seemingly inconsequential
wordless act was packed a lifetime of wisdom.
It’s an image with the words “Don’t Waste Your Life”
written all over it. It’s the image from that evening
that is etched in my memory. It is pure
gold.
And
what does a doctor looking at his own death in the
eye write in an internet farewell posting? How does
he conclude his life? What is the last paragraph, the
last words, chosen to say to his family and friends?
How does he say goodbye?
As
I look back on my life story, I am thankful for
family, friends, and a career I enjoyed. But most of
all I am thankful that God has given me hope in
Christ for an eternal life that I do not deserve.
Although I may appear to be a good person, my own
goodness could never earn me a spot in heaven. My sin
merits God’s wrath, but Jesus came and took that
punishment for all who will believe. Instead of the
wrath we deserve, God offers the free gift of eternal
life to all who trust in Jesus. To God be the glory
forever. Love to all, Bill
On
that day when Bill left here he found himself before
a holy, majestic, and glorious God. And what did Bill
do? From his farewell writing, it is clear he did not
stupidly start gabbing about who he thought he was
better than as for why he deserved heaven not hell.
He did not stand there, sin-drenched, before a
sinless God, his back to Christ, holding up his
pathetic list of do-goodies and think the Father
would nullify the death of his Son for someone who,
by standards he made up, considers himself “good”.
These are not the words of a man who would be so
audacious as to tell God how to do
God.
These
are, rather, the words of one who knew God to be
sinless and knew himself to be sinful. He recognized
the fact that a sinner could never dwell with a
sinless, holy God. Only an act of God, doing the
impossible, making the sinful sinless, could bring
God to dwell with man.
Thus when Bill
came into that place where Christ, the one who became
the act of God and who, in that act, made Bill
sinless, was sitting, Bill could not stand. He could
only fall on his face and worship. It’s the only
response that comes close to what hell-deserving-sin
forgiveness means.
And from
His fullness we have all received, grace upon
grace.
Discontentment
Usually, when we talk about discontentment, we discuss matters financial and material. "I wish I had ...." or "I don't have enough..." However, Bridges goes the path of unchanging circumstances, which probably gets closer to the heart of what Paul meant when he said he'd learned to be content in whatever circumstance he found himself (Philippians 4.11-12). Drawing from his experience of a long-time single prior to marriage, Bridges lends very credible advice anecdotally.
So, how do we fight this sin (and remember, discontentment is a sin, which must be put to death)? Grim resignation is not a solution. That's simply acceptance without a heart's change. We must truly trust the Lord, that He knows what's best for us in every single circumstance. We must accept His sovereign providence, His goodness toward us and His unfailing mercy, even if those situations seem so difficult for us.
There's a moving response from a friend sent to him after the death of his first wife which helps:
Lord, I am willing to –
Receive what you give,
Lack what you withhold,
Relinquish what you take.
The powerful truth of God's Word can come to bear in killing this sin. Psalm 139.13 says, "For you formed my inward parts; you knitted me together in my mother's womb." And Job is also helpful "Naked I came from my mother's womb and naked shall I return. The Lord gave and the Lord has taken away; blessed be the name of the Lord." (Job 1.21, ESV) I've already mentioned Philippians 4.11-12: "Not that I am speaking of being in need, for I have learned in whatever situation I am to be content. I know how to be brought low, and I know how to abound. In any and every circumstance, I have learned the secret of facing plenty and hunger, abundance and need."
So, I trust no matter what circumstance you find yourself in during these special holy days, that you'll find yourself laying hold with great dependence upon God who knows what's best for you, has planned nothing but good for you and is with you all along the way. He is Immanuel.